Traveling Ideas

Mossadegh and the Anti-Imperialist Struggle in Egypt

Abstract

In 1953, at the heat of the anti-colonial struggle in the Middle East, Iran’s democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh was overthrown in a coup instigated by the U.S. and Britain. Mossadegh, who initiated the nationalization of the Iranian oil industry, was most influential for this undertaking not only in Iran but also in the Middle East writ large. This article explores the Mossadegh era in Iran (1951-1953) and its political reverberations in pre- and post- 1952 Egypt. It demonstrates that the spirit of ‘Mossadeghism’ inspired Egyptian nationalist politics in the 1950s, including Abd al-Nasser’s fateful nationalization of the Suez Canal in 1956.